Intern: Rich Ahroon
Mentor: Paul Forster
Faculty Sponsor: Dr. Tony Cheetham
Supporting Grant Agency: Materials Research and Engineering Center and The National Science Foundation
Academic Major: Biotechnical Engineering
Project Title: "Exploratory Synthesis of Porous Material from Metal Dicarboxylates"
Abstract: Nanoporous materials, which are compounds possessing open frameworks capable of admitting small molecules, have been extensively studied due to their unique and technologically important properties. Effective pore sizes in microporous solids range from 3 angstoms to over 10 angstoms, a size which is sufficient to permit the diffusion of small molecules. This feature gives rise to many of the most important applications of these materials, such as their excellent ion-exchange properties in the hydrated state as well as absorption and catalytic properties.
Recently, several new families of open framework compounds have been explored which offer the promise of improvements over existing materials as well as new applications for nanoporous materials. My research is geared at developing new materials of technological importance through a series of exploratory hydrothermal syntheses of different metal dicarboxylates. Different synthetic conditions were explored in an attempt to grow single crystals for structural characterization by X-ray diffraction.
New Material: Zinc Aminodisuccinate
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